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Strategies & Market Trends : Value Investing -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: peter michaelson who wrote (10903)	7/9/2000 11:51:01 PM
From: James Clarke	Respond to of 78470

While leaving Paul to defend his tone, I will say that I would be richer if I had listened when he posted the same diatribe to me about a year ago. The walking forward vs. walking backward thing looks trite until you try both and realize your brain is geared to one but not the other. I am very good with valuation and financial details, but I got absolutely killed shorting a series of stocks. I had most of them right in the end, but got stopped out (or chickened out) just before they crashed, which made the losses even more painful. Like Paul said, its something every value investor thinks they can do, and I know some who can. But I can't. What I learned about myself is that I can gut out a stock I own until it works, but I get quickly scared out of a short position. And that basically guarantees losses. So I don't do it anymore. If it took a few losses to learn that lesson, fine. But it is one you've got to learn yourself. But saying it can't be done is probably not real productive - saying its not as easy as it looks is more on the mark. If it works for you, God bless ya. And if you've never shorted a stock, and want to try it, I wouldn't discourage some small bets to see if it works for you.